


I knew him

by opposablethumbs



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Captain America: The Winter Soldier, M/M, Missing Scene, Or Is he?, Public Blow Jobs, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, bonus fanart, but it's dark so that's okay?, whoops! smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-12
Updated: 2017-06-12
Packaged: 2018-11-13 10:28:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11183211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/opposablethumbs/pseuds/opposablethumbs
Summary: After Steve gets out of the hospital, he goes looking for a particular kind of trouble. Instead he finds the another, in the form of the Winter Soldier.





	I knew him

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by the incomparable [nursedarry](http://archiveofourown.org/users/NurseDarry/pseuds/NurseDarry), with extensive hand-holding by [whatthefoucault](http://archiveofourown.org/users/whatthefoucault/pseuds/whatthefoucault). I also entirely blame [cobaltmoony](http://archiveofourown.org/users/cobaltmoony) for this.
> 
> Thank you all, my angels.
> 
> Bonus art at the end, by me! NSFW chibis, rated the same as the fic.

“I’m _fine_ ,” Steve protests as Natasha helps him out of the car and up the short flight of steps to her brownstone apartment.

She huffs, nudging closer in an attempt to take a bit more of his weight. “Steve,” she says in her most patient impatient voice, “you go beaten, shot, and half-drowned three days ago.”

“I was there,” Steve grumbles as she fishes for her keys in her pocket.

Pulling them out and unlocking the door, Natasha carries on as if she hasn’t heard him. “By all rights you should be in a coma, if not worse.”

She marches him (gently) through the hall before depositing him on her couch. Steve looks around the apartment. He’s never been to Natasha’s place before, and he hadn’t known what to expect. It’s a decent size, surprisingly messy for someone as collected as she is, albeit a little impersonal without any pictures or photographs on the walls.

“You want coffee?” she calls through from the kitchen.

“Sure!” he replies, settling back against the cushions. For a moment, he closes his eyes. He is _tired_ in ways he’s not been since before the serum. It riles him to feel this way, weak and wounded, especially as the last of SHIELD burns around them. But deep down he knows that without the serum he’d be dead, not just sitting on a friend’s couch with an already-fading scar and yellowing bruises adorning his midriff.

Natasha is right. He’s lucky to be alive.

****

“Bucky!” Steve bolts awake before pain doubles him back over. “Ah goddam son-of-a…”

Natasha is at his side. “Steve, are you okay?” Her hands are on him. “What’s wrong?”

He goes to reply ‘I’m fine’, but it’s a strangled sob that escapes instead. Natasha, The Black Widow, isn’t exactly known for her emotional displays but she seems to get it straight away. She pulls his face into her torso, sitting down he is level with her stomach, and simply strokes his hair and doesn’t make him try to talk.

Finally, Steve’s voice comes back to him, and he feels a flush of embarrassment at being held as he is. He coughs lightly and pulls back a little way. She lets him go.

Steve looks at the tear-stains darkening her t-shirt and then up to her eyes. “I guess we’re matching now,” he says.

Absently she brushes the damp cotton over her own scar. “No more bikinis for you either, Rogers,” she says.

He smiles a little. “How long was I asleep?” he says as she settles back into her chair.

“Long enough for your coffee to go cold,” she says, nodding at the mug on the table. He hadn’t even heard her bring it in. Having intended to rest his eyes for a few minutes, he’d instead slept away what appeared to be the better part of the day; if the light coming in through the window is any guide.

“It was Bucky, you know, who did this.”

She nods. “And I’m pretty sure it was him who fished you out of the Potomac as well.”

Vague memories of being hauled onto the bank echo murkily in Steve’s mind, along with a pair of black boots walking away. “But why would he do that?” he asks, as much to himself as Natasha.

Regardless, she shrugs. “Maybe you got through to him,” she suggests. “You do have an annoying ability to do that.”

Steve takes a deep breath, filling his aching lungs, and then letting it out. “Maybe,” he says. “But then he left.”

“It’s what assassins do,” replies Natasha. Her face is stone for a few seconds before she brightens again. “You hungry?”

That is a question with a simple answer at least. “I’m so hungry I would eat Thor’s cooking,” he tells her.

Natasha’s eyes go wide. “Are you sure you’re not still concussed?”

“If I say ‘yes’, can we order Thai _and_ Italian?”

“Yes.”

“Then ‘yes’,” Steve replies.

****

Another couple of days of light duties, and Steve is feeling better. That is to say, the idea of sleeping or reading a book or even cleaning Natasha’s oven has lost its appeal. He just wants to _do_ something.

Natasha has gone out for the evening. She says it’s nothing to worry about, but Steve saw her put the pass for Stark Tower into her purse. With SHIELD fallen, he isn’t sure what that means. Surely if it was just dinner with Tony and Pepper, she would have invited him along. After all, how strenuous can dinner be? And she has to know he’s climbing the walls, stuck inside for so long.

 

A siren sounds in the distance, and it has Steve up and on his feet without a second thought. He presses his nose up against the window and stares out into the twilight. When he first found himself in the here and now, SHIELD gave him both a place and a purpose. Now, without either, he finds himself wondering where that leaves him.

A second siren wails through the streets, closer than the first, and again Steve is moving without thinking; towards the guest bedroom and his boxed possessions. He searches through, finding a box of clothing at the bottom of the stack. In it, among sweaters and t-shirts, are a few of his old uniforms. Tony had laughed at him when he found out Steve kept them, torn and battered and in some cases slightly burned, but Steve came from a time when you’d mend a frayed pair of slacks, not just throw them away. He pulls out one of the least mangled suits, an immediate precursor to the stealth suit he’d been wearing on his last few missions for Fury. It doesn’t have as much padding at the knee and the torso has carbon fiber inserts. He’d told Tony to take those out, they hindered his flexibility. And anyway, he has his shield were someone to try, say, shooting at his core.

The irony isn’t lost on him.

He pulls off his sweatpants and tee, tugging on the tight suit trousers instead. The exit wound still aches a little, and the fact that there is even still a mark there tells how much damage the antipersonnel bullet did as it ripped through him. The serum is good, but it has its limits. It works on the worst injuries first, leaving skin and tissue healing until organs and bones have healed.

He’s just donning his cowl when the front door opens.

“Steve?” Natasha calls into the flat.

Steve casts about quickly, feeling very much like he’s been caught in the act. His eyes alight on the window. If he just hopped out of it and into the night, Nat would be none the wiser. And it isn’t like he’s taking on Odin. He’s just going to make a circuit of the neighbourhood, look for any folks in need, and hopefully do some good. Everything with SHIELD has left a bitter taste in his mouth, and the chance for some honest labour, free of politics and machinations, is terribly appealing.

Of course, in the time he has spent thinking it through, Natasha has found him.

“What the hell, Rogers,” she says, somehow blocking the door with her tiny body; her hands on her hips.

“I, uh…”

“You know you need to rest.”

“I’ve been resting.”

“Oh yes, cleaning every square inch of my apartment is really taking it easy.”

They eyeball each other meaningfully.

Finally, Steve throws up his hands in exasperation. “I can’t just sit on my ass, Nat, you know that. The HYDRA plants that were inside SHIELD are still at large, and if nothing else we did a lot of damage taking down those helicarriers.” He points out the window. “I _should_ be out there.”

Relaxing slowly, eyes tracking Steve’s movements warily, Natasha nods. “I get it, I really do. This is the first time I’ve not had someone giving me orders since I was… eight, I think. But just because there’s no one giving orders, it doesn’t mean you _have_ to. Hydra is on the multi-agency radar now, and Stark is dealing with recovery.”

“I could be looking for Bucky,” Steve remarks.

“I’ve told you,” Natasha says, “he’s long gone. It’s spycraft 101.Get in, get out, don’t get caught. There’s literally nothing better for you to do than stay here, lay low, and heal.”

“There’s always better things,” Steve counters. “Even without SHIELD, I can still help. There’s bank robberies, muggings, sex traffickers…”

To his surprise, Natasha laughs. “So you’re turning cop, Cap?”

Irritation flashes through him. “That isn’t it at all. I need…”

“You need to bust some skulls,” Nat replies calmly.

“I don’t… what…”

“Just look at yourself, Steve.” She gives him a moment to dial down, to look at how he’s up on the balls of his feet, fists clenched like that bony kid who’d take on punks twice his size in back alleys.

“I… want to bust some skulls,” he admits, eyes lowered.

Nat stands aside, leaving the doorway open. “Okay, you get on that,” she says.

Steve blinks at her. “What?”

She shrugs. “You want someone to talk you out of it? Call Sam. I just needed you to be honest about it. If you go out there thinking you’re doing it out of some noble purpose, you’ll either get hurt or hurt someone worse than you mean to.”

Steve pulls the bunched up cowl down over his eyes. He smoothes his hands of the padded front of his vest, straightening it out from the box. “Thanks, Nat,” he says.

She smiles one of her rare, honest smiles, the kind that brightens her eyes. “Hey, what are friends for?” she asks. “And speaking of which, you might want to check out the hall.”

Steve frowns a little, feeling the tug of leather over his brow and stalks out into the hall. There, resting against the wall, is his shield.

He spins back to Nat. “How..?”

“Stark,” she says. “He had people trawling the river as soon as he heard what’d happened. Fished this out two days ago.”

Steve stoops and scoops up his shield. The weight of it, or rather the lack of weight of it, is comforting in his hand. It’s like being reunited with a part of himself. “He’s a good man,” he says. “Howard would’ve been proud.”

And with that, he turns and heads off into the night.

****

Patrolling the streets, Steve decides, isn’t nearly as satisfying as he’d expected it to be. After all, he doesn’t really want to jeopardise any police investigations, and Nat is right: if he gets in a fight with a common Joe Criminal, no one wins. So his mission to find a) a supervillain, who is b) acting in a way that is extrajudicial to the NYPD and c) possibly punch them, turns into Steve going on a moonlight tour of some of the seedier parts of Brooklyn. Straight out of the ice, Steve had visited a few of the places he’d known back then: the site of his childhood tenement, long since torn down; Brubaker’s Bakery (still in business but turned into a cafe by the granddaughter of the Brubaker Steve had gone to school with). They were the kind of places you found in walking maps of ‘Old New York’, safe locations that have gentrified over the years.

Tonight, however, Steve is following a different path. His route takes him from Nat’s place in Brighton Beach, up into Brooklyn proper, and then back out to the west. He struggles to place exactly where he is until he finds himself on a poorly-lit riverfront street, the remains of a small dock dipping it’s crumbling stone into the bay.

“It can’t be,” he mutters to himself.

But, yes, it can. He’s in Red Hook. His feet have carried him to the exact dock where Bucky used to work, and directly across the road is the beaten-up brick office building where Steve was employed. For everything that’s changed, this place is unmistakeable; it had been run down the first time he clapped eyes on it in ‘38. Even the adjoining empty lot looks like he remembers it, the only addition being a chain link fence surrounding it. A smile catches Steve’s face. It was in that lot, among towering crates of unlabelled goods, that Bucky had first kissed him; rough and full of promise. Just looking at Bucky’s mouth had made Steve weak at the knees for days after, imagining how the texture of his lips and their gentle curve would feel travelling over Steve’s skin, taking him in…

Red Hook had always spelled trouble, with a side of sweetness.

Faint movement in Steve’s peripheral vision snaps him out of his reverie. He spins, seeing a darker shadow moving inside the gloomy lot.

“Please be a super-villain, please be a super-villain” he chants to himself, taking a run-up and scaling the twenty foot fence with ease.

He lands on the other side with a soft thud. Lifting his head, he sees it again. A movement and this time, a flash of something metallic.

Steve’s heart is in his throat with an impossible thought. “Bucky?”

No answer comes, but somehow that only spurs Steve on. Whoever is moving through the shadows is doing so silently, any sounds they’re making beyond even super-soldier hearing.

He pulls his shield from its harness and hold it in front of himself. sets up a search pattern, herding whomever it is away from any easy point of escape and back into the rear of the lot. He catches just the faintest, fleeting glimpses of the man… it’s definitely a man… that he’s pursuing. Dark clothes. A gleam at hip, calf, and across his broad shoulders. Long hair and feral eyes that glimmer just once as the target turns around. With each little hint, hope grows in Steve’s chest, along with the feeling that perhaps he isn’t following the mysterious character as much as he is being _led_.

At last, they make it to the back of the lot, under the concrete shelter of the loading bay. There is a single security light casting an arch of harsh light, in which stands…

“Bucky?” Steve asks again.

Bucky shakes his head, the rat tails of his long hair moving with the motion. “You keep calling me that,” he says. His voice sounds rough and unused.

“It’s your name,” Steve replies.

Bucky doesn’t respond.

Steve wets his lips. “Do you know who _I_ am?” he asks.

Bucky hesitates for a fraction of a second and then shakes his head.

Steve feels excitement-spiked adrenaline surge through him. “Do you know where we are?” he presses.

“No,” Bucky replies.

Steve narrows his eyes, pinching out the glare from the light to get a good read of Bucky’s face. “So why are you here then?” he asks.

“I followed you.”

Bucky... The Winter Soldier... _whoever_ is standing there, doesn’t seem to see the incongruity of claiming not to know who Steve is, but having followed him to this one particular spot that means so much to them both.

Steve takes a step forward and suddenly Bucky is on guard, his hand on his knife. In the stillness of the night, the sounds of the city muffled by the containers filling the lot, Steve hears the faint whirr of motorised metal sliding over motorised metal. He registers it as Bucky’s arm calibrating, getting ready to fight.

“Is that why you tracked me down?” he asks, keeping his voice calm even as his palms begin to sweat. “To finish what you started?”

“You’re my mission,” Bucky replies hollowly, echoing the words he’d said aboard the helicarrier.

Again, Steve takes another step closer. This time, however, Bucky backs away. First one step, then two, and then he’s turning to flee…

Steve pounces, grabbing Bucky by the shoulder and yanking him bodily around. With muscle-memory grace, Bucky blocks Steve, simultaneously lashing out with his metal arm and knocking Steve’s shield away with a resounding clang.

They fight, but it only takes a couple of hits for Steve to realise that Bucky is holding back, pulling his punches. Once or twice, Steve deliberately lets his guard down to see if Bucky takes the shot. He doesn’t, but nor does he stop. It’s as though the only thing he knows is the fight, the motions, but there is a disconnect with how his body moves and how he reacts.

Feinting backwards, Steve rolls to recover his shield. Unfortunately he forgets that the deep muscles surrounding his spine are still healing and in the span of seconds that he is incapacitated by pain, Bucky is on him, pinning him with strong, coiled thighs and a hand to each shoulder. The sweat-damp fabric of Steve’s suit emphasises the heat differential between Bucky’s two palms; one burning hot, the other achingly cold.

Despite himself and the situation, Steve feels himself react to the proximity; to the familiarity and electrifying strangeness of this man over him. Bucky leans in, bringing even more of their bodies into contact and Steve has to fight the dual urges to struggle and arch up into Bucky’s grasp, or to melt into it.

“Buck,” he says, barely a whisper and nearly a prayer.

Bucky’s eyes narrow. “Tell me your name,” he demands.

Steve’s heart stops. He stares up into the ice-grey irises staring back at him. “S… Steve,” he says.

Bucky’s frown deepens. “Not ‘Stevie’?” He sounds genuinely perplexed.

Careful to avoid any sharp movement, Steve shakes his head. “Not often,” he says. “And only ever really for you.”

Without warning, Bucky pushes himself up and away from Steve, turning his back on on him. He shoulders are hunched, his head lowered. He suddenly seems so… small.

Steve clambers to his feet, scooping up his shield and, after an indecisive pause, clips it into its magnetic holster. He takes a pace towards Bucky, and another. This time however, Bucky doesn’t attempt to escape and Steve dares to reach out for him, placing a hand tentatively on his right shoulder.

Bucky leans back into the touch: not by much, but Steve can definitely sense an increase in pressure.

“They… messed with things,” Bucky says. He taps the side of his head with his left hand, the metal finger glinting in the stark light. “In here. But they didn’t get everything. Seeing your face; it was like waking up. And they tried to take it away again, but it didn’t work. I knew.”

Steve can barely find the breath to speak. “Knew what?”

Turning to face Steve, a smile ghosts across Bucky’s lips. “That you were important. To me.”

“That’s why you pulled me out of the river.”

“Yes,” says Bucky. His jaw ripples as he clenches his teeth. “I had pieces. I’m still putting them together.”

“Tell me what you remember.”

Bucky pouts thoughtfully, and Steve’s gaze flickers to his lips. His own memories stir, from that life before; of tasting cigarette smoke on Bucky’s tongue and long nights spent in each other’s arms. As he lifts his eyes, he realises Bucky has been watching him.

“I remember… your face. Your hands. I remember the sound of your voice.” A deeper frown twitches Buck’s heavy brow. “And I remember you being smaller.” He pauses. “I’ve said that before.”

“Yeah, you have,” Steve confirms.

“We were friends.”

Steve nods.

“We were more than friends.”

“Yes. We were.”

“Jeez, I want you so bad.”

The last takes Steve a few heartbeats to process. “You… you don’t… you can’t…”

“I really can,” Bucky says, moving closer. “I might not have everything, but what I’ve got… it’s mine. What I do with it is _my_ choice.” He laughs; an honest to goodness laugh that doesn’t come from the Soldier. “Hell, that feels so good just to say.”

“Buck, you and me…”

Bucky silences him with a kiss. Not the half-shy, half-stubborn kiss they shared in this same lot some seventy-something years ago, but the kind from the night before Bucky shipped out. It’s the same as the first time they could be alone after Austria, or the two days of leave they got in London before the Alps. Bucky might not recognise his own name, but the way he touches Steve there; there and oh god, _there_ , can only come from the intimacy of long acquaintance.

Steve doesn’t realise Buck has been guiding them backwards until his shield hits the wall and the vibranium rings out into the dark night. He lets out a little ‘oof’ of surprise and Bucky pulls back far enough to look him in the eye.

“I didn’t come here to fight,” he says, dropping his knife by his feet.

“I did,” Steve replies. He reaches up and tangles his fingers into Bucky’s long locks, tugging him back in.

The urgency between them builds quickly, the need to feel and touch and taste making Steve giddy. He’s arching into every caress, rubbing himself shamelessly and needfully against the hard planes of Bucky’s torso, his hips and his crotch. Buck has one thigh threaded between Steve’s and Steve can feel the hard muscle trembling. He strokes the exposed portion of Bucky’s throat and then follows his fingers with his lips, nibbling the skin, leaving marks because he damn well can.

It’s stupid and wonderful and it only gets better as every time Steve pushes against him, Bucky pushes back, until they’re both gasping and desperate.

“Fuck, Stevie,” Bucky mutters, his lips pressed against Steve’s temple and his breath hot and damp in Steve’s ear. “You sure _you_ want this?”

Steve rumbles deep in his chest, the vibrations passing between them. “Please.”

With deliberate slowness, Bucky pops the first three buttons of Steve’s pants, each one dragging a louder gasp from between Steve’s lips.

“I remember them too,” he says, voice low and growling, “those sweet little noises you make.”

“You remember I don’t like bein’ teased?” Steve replies, tipping his head back to meet the cool concrete.

“Yup,” Bucky replies, even as he slides a palm over the straining fabric of Steve’s suit trousers.

Steve laughs hoarsely. “Jerk.”

Mercifully, Buck doesn’t keep him waiting, sinking to his knees in front of him and tugging Steve’s pants so they fall past his hips and into a puddle on the floor.

“No underwear?” Bucky asks, and there’s the trademark Barnes swagger in his tone.

“I know,” Steve replies, attempting to match him, “what would my mom say?”

Bucky tips his head. “Mom?” he asks, before nuzzling into the blonde curls of Steve’s crotch.

There’s so much in how he moves that’s new to Steve, but even more that is achingly familiar. Steve tangles his fingers into Bucky’s hair once again. It feels different, the lengthened strands where there used to be short tousles, but the mewls Buck makes as Steve tugs are much the same. The heat of Buck’s mouth is a constant, too, and Steve might be embarrassed at how quickly he’s reduced to sobs and writhing pleads if it wasn’t so damned perfect. The wall at his back is all that’s holding him up, and he thinks his hand in Bucky’s hair is the only thing keeping him from flying away. He feels Buck tuck him back away and fasten him up, and as soon as he has control back over his muscles, he pulls Buck upright and into a kiss.

“So good, Buck,” he praises softly. “Can’t believe I’ve got you back.”

When Bucky doesn’t answer, he presses on the other man’s shoulders, nudging him backwards. “You _are_ staying, aren’t you?” he says.

Bucky shakes his head, as though words might betray him.

“You don’t have to be afraid.” Steve feels desperation of a different kind swell in him. “I know good people.”

“Exactly. I’m not ‘good people’.”

“I know what you’ve done…” Steve begins but Bucky cuts him off.

“No, you don’t. Even _I_ don’t know everything. Not yet.”

Anger is rising in Steve’s chest. “Then I gotta ask. What the hell was this about?”

A small, sad smile plays across Bucky’s lips. “Because I’m gonna learn. And it’s not gonna be like this.” He reaches up and strokes Steve’s face, but it’s with the cold metal of his prosthetic hand.

Steve blinks back blurry tears. “Buck…”

But Bucky is already backing into the shadows, disappearing into the night. “I’ve got to do this, Stevie,” he says, all Buck, and then his voice hardens into the Soldier. “Don’t follow.”

It takes every bit of Steve’s strength not to do just that. Instead, he picks up the knife Bucky abandoned, tucks it into his pants, and heads home.

****

“Steve?” Nat calls as he lets himself in through her triple locked front door. “That you, or do I need to fetch my knife?”

“It’s me,” he confirms, shucking off his shield and depositing it beside the shoe rack.

She pokes her head out of the lounge. “Catch any bad guys?”

Steve shakes his head and the wry half smile melts from her face as she stares into his eyes.

“What’s happened,” she says.

Steve takes a deep breath. “You know how you said Buck would be long gone?”

She nods.

“Well I saw him.”

She folds her arms across her chest, her hoody bunching like her brow. “Are you sure? You got pretty banged about, and sometime we all see what we want to.”

Steve laughs weakly. “Oh, I’m sure. Things got pretty close and personal.”

“You fought.”

“Among other things.”

Nat gives him a curious look. “I get the feeling I should be drinking vodka before we go any further.”

“Got a spare… bottle, or two?” Steve asks.

She walks over to him, first patting his arm and then linking through it to lead him down the hall. “Sure, Steve. Sure.”

****

Natasha picks up the third bottle of vodka and turns it upside down, spilling a few drips onto the carpet.

“Well, that’s somethin’,” she says. “A whole lot of something. You know, most agents live in fear of the Winter Soldier. An’ you had him sucking your…”

“Yeah, I was there, thanks Romanoff,” Steve says, cutting her off.

“So he really just walked away? And you let him?”

“Again, yes.”

Natasha snorts. “One-night-stand-Rogers. High five, Cap!” She holds up her hand.

Steve looks at her. “Can you take this seriously?” he says.

Nat straightens up, pushing her hair behind her ears. “Yes,” she says, clearing her throat. “Yes, of course. But first… you’re _gay_?”

“Not the time, Natasha.”

“Okay,” she says with a small chuckle. “What do you want?”

A vivid memory of Bucky’s mouth flashes through Steve’s mind. He shakes his head to dismiss it. “I want to know about him. I want to know how they made him, and how they used him. Everything.”

Nat taps her lips. “Difficult,” she says. “And why?”

“Because he think he has to do this alone. And he doesn’t.”

She takes a deep breath. “Ah, the Steve Rogers special.”

“Sure,” Steve says, knocking back the last of the vodka in his glass and wishing it had taken more of the edge off than it has. “Do you have any intel, any contacts you could call?”

“Probably,” Natasha replies. “I know a retired KGB guy in Nizhny, always been a bit of a fan of the Soldier. Told me one time he’d got his hands on a classified file.” She gets to her feet, dusting her hands on her thighs. “I’ll sort flights in the morning. For now… I’m going to bed and absolutely not thinking about you in an empty lot with your pants ‘round your ankles.” She scrunches up her nose.

“I only told you exactly what happened because we’re friends, now,” Steve says, also standing.

“It’s okay,” she says. “I’m used to oversharers. I’ve known Clint for over a decade.”

Steve shrugs. He’d hardly say Clint Barton was loose-lipped, but Natasha does know him better. “When will you know if your man has anything useful?” he says.

She shrugs. “A few days. A week. He’s a squirrelly one.”

“And I just… wait?” Steve asks, definitely not pouting.

“No, you spend the week moving in with Tony.”

Steve blinks at her as she clicks her fingers. “That’s right,” she says. “I didn’t tell you. Stark is converting the tower into an HQ for the Avengers. Everyone’s invited. You, me, Clint, Bruce...”

“But that’s his and Pepper’s home,” says Steve.

Nat shrugs. “Apparently she’s moving back out west.”

“And you’d be up for us all gathered together like that?”

“Maybe,” she says. “The rent on this place is kind of crazy. But that infodump has got a lot of people asking a lot of questions. Possibly not the kind of questions we want tied to us right now.”

“If there’s anything I can do…”

She waves him off. “Stark’s on that too,” she says. “You’ll help by staying as far from it as you can.” A wicked little smirk graces her lips. “Trespassing, public lewdness, abetting a known fugitive? We can’t have people thinking you have a dark side, can we?” Tipping up on her toes, she presses a kiss to his cheek.

“Night, Cap,” she says. “I hope you made the right call.”

Steve watches her walk (and very slightly sway) down the hall, enter her room and close the door behind her.

“Me too, Natasha,” he says to himself.

 

****

**And now for the NSFW art**

No, really...

 

_I remember them too, those sweet little noises you make._

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> The art is also up over on my [tumblr](https://opposablethumbs-ao3.tumblr.com/post/161773457357/i-remember-them-too-those-sweet-little-noises-you)!


End file.
